


Wanna Be Not-Perfect With Me?

by ren_ascent



Series: Your Sweet Touch [6]
Category: Pushing Daisies, Supernatural
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Crossover, Fluff, M/M, Ned POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-03
Updated: 2019-12-03
Packaged: 2021-02-25 04:34:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21650173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ren_ascent/pseuds/ren_ascent
Summary: See, it's not that Ned wants Dean to leave him. It's just inevitable and Ned's internal clock is warning him that's it's going to happen soon.
Relationships: Ned (Pushing Daisies)/Dean Winchester
Series: Your Sweet Touch [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1549603
Comments: 6
Kudos: 23





	Wanna Be Not-Perfect With Me?

**Author's Note:**

> Not a new work. Originally posted in 2014 under my old pseud rippedoutgrace. 
> 
> Last in the series!

He thinks he’ll never get used to it. The smell of his hair in the morning, the sheer pleasure of feeling warm skin dimpling under his sleep-slow fingers. It’s...amazing. And something he thought he’d never have. Every morning when he wakes up, every night when he unwinds from his day. It’s Dean and his snarky one-liners and every time he rolls his eyes, he softens it with a smile. Dean is here and miracle of miracles, he hasn’t left Ned yet.

He feels ungenerous sometimes, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but he can’t help it. It’s going to happen. People leave him.

It’s just what they do.

***

“Hey, so we’ve got a possible case a little bit north of here,” Dean starts out one morning, hanging up his call with his brother and running a hand through his hair. Ned very carefully keeps breathing nice and even, in and out. Tries to listen to the rest of what Dean’s saying. Breathe, Ned. “This one looks pretty cut and dry though.”

“What is it? Do you know?” He’s proud of how steady his voice is. Turns an interested face towards Dean.

Dean scoffs, “Poltergeist. Low-level stuff, but someone’s gotta take care of it.” He shrugs, but Ned doesn’t think he looks too put out. Maybe he’s not. Maybe he wants to leave, to find a job, to find dangerous creatures and spirits and things that Ned thought only existed in the mind of Hollywood. To leave him.

“You can’t ask someone else to take care of it?” he asks, and as soon as it’s out of his mouth, he’s wincing with how petulant it sounds. Thankfully, Dean doesn’t seem to notice.

“Hey,” he says, squeezes Ned’s arm. “I’ll be okay. Back before you know it.” Dean and Sam are gone in their shiny black car before the dinner rush is over.

***

“Wait, hello? Dean? Can you – ah, damn it,” Ned curses. He glares at his phone like it’s the source of all his problems. And right now, it is the source of at least one problem – namely, he can’t get a hold of Dean. Not that anything’s wrong, of course, but he just...misses him. And it’s been days.

His phone bleats at him and he’s answering before it’s finished a single ring. “Dean?” A crackling white noise fills his ear.

“Still nothing?” Chuck asks from the armchair she’s occupying. She’s got her index finger marking a page about a third of the way through an impressively thick novel, peers at Ned and then glances pointedly at his phone. Ned shakes his head.

“Just static,” he sighs. “It’s not me, right? He’s just...in a bad area. No cell coverage or – or he’s going through a tunnel. Several tunnels. Or an elevator. Or something.”

Chuck reaches out with a wooden back scratcher he uses on Digby sometimes and pets his arm with it. “I’d say don’t worry, but I know you’re worrying. He’s fine, okay? He’ll be back before you know it.”

He lets Chuck scratch at his arm a few more times before grumbling, “I don’t even understand that phrase.” And he’s not worrying. At least, not how Chuck thinks he is. He knows Dean can do his job – he’s the best in business for a reason. Ned’s worried that he’ll find a job while he’s out there and delay coming home over and over again until Ned’s nothing more than a fading memory.

It’s a legitimate concern, okay? The Winchesters have a history after all and history is not to be ignored. They lived on the road for the last thirty years, so what’s to say they don’t return to that life?

He keeps it to himself though because he’s fairly certain Chuck would disagree and right now, he’s not sure he wants anyone disagreeing with him.

He spends the next three days glued to his phone. It’s in his apron pocket when he’s in the kitchen, in his pants pocket when he’s in the apartment, on the sink counter when he’s in the shower. Still nothing. The fatalist in him mockingly reminds him that this was all inevitable anyway. Which is why he’s genuinely surprised to see a text message the following morning from an unknown number. He didn’t even hear his phone in his sleep.

_hey man, it’s dean. sorry bout not calling. phone broke this is my other number. b home soon_

He squints for a while at the message, wondering how many ‘other numbers’ Dean has before typing out a response.

_good._

He doesn’t have much else to say. Really. He doesn’t.

***

It’s another two days before Dean makes it back. He looks tired, smells worse, limps with a bruised hip, and has a cut above his eyebrow that’s been taped together with butterfly bandages. He’s also got a brilliant smile on his face and that’s the part Ned can’t ignore.

He invites Ned to shower with him, shooting him a cheeky wink, but Ned refuses. “How about I make you something to eat?” he offers instead.

The smile he gets in return is nothing short of beatific.

He can hear Dean singing in the shower, can imagine him doing a slightly uncoordinated dance to the tune of his humming. Can imagine the wince he makes when he jostles his bruised body. He doesn’t have to imagine the way Dean curls around him while he stands at the stove because he’s there and his skin is flushed pink from the shower and Ned can tell he’s bare chested without turning around.

“Mmm, smells good,” he murmurs in Ned’s ear as he hooks his chin over his shoulder to peer at the pot boiling water full of pasta noodles. Ned figured spaghetti was always a good choice and Dean never seemed to mind it. He doesn’t think he’s tense under Dean’s hands but Dean freezes anyway. Steps back a little. “Everything okay?”

Ned gives the cooking noodles another good stir before turning around. Dean doesn’t look defensive per se, but he’s not inviting either, one arm wrapped loosely around his bare middle. He sighs, mostly at himself. Okay, completely at himself.

“Everything’s fine I just – I mean, I,”

“What?” Dean hasn’t dropped his arm yet and his eyes are wary. Searching.

“I missed you is all. It wasn’t the same without you here,” Ned finally settles on. It’s the truth at least, just... not all of it. The confession feels too raw, too open either way.

Dean lets out a short huff of air, not even quite a laugh. “I missed you too.” His eyes are still questioning though.

Dinner is tense.

Ned knows it’s his fault.

***

See, it’s not that Ned wants Dean to leave him. It’s just inevitable and Ned’s internal clock is warning him that it’s going to happen soon. Pull back now, leave while you can, protect your heart, brace for fallout.

He turns the shower on hot, nearly uncomfortably warm, and watches his face in the mirror above the sink, steam curling around the edges.

“You don’t want him to go,” he tells his reflection. “You want him here. He’s good for you.” He just can’t bring himself to say what he wants to. Dean doesn’t want to leave you either.

It’s getting hard to breathe and Ned can’t tell if it’s the hot condensation or his chest tightening. His face slowly disappears behind the clouds and he gets in the shower, hisses at the temperature but doesn’t adjust it. Ned scrubs his skin until it’s pink and sensitive, as if he can wash away negative thoughts. He imagines it. Every swipe of soap dislodges the bad, the ugly, the unwanted. Every drop of water sluices them away. The drain takes them away through the pipes, away from Ned, away from Dean, away from this relationship.

Surprisingly, he feels better when he gets out of the bathroom. Not perfect, not one hundred percent, but...better. Dean’s lying on his back across the bed, one foot crossed over a bent knee and bare toes wiggling to the beat of whatever he’s listening to on his pink (pink?) mp3 player. He turns when Ned walks in and eases an earbud out of his ear. “You look like you’re feeling better.”

“I am feeling better.”

Dean twirls the loose earbud between his fingers and eyes Ned speculatively. “Good,” he nods. “That’s good.”

Ned sits on the bed, close but not crowding Dean and rubs a hand through his wet hair. Lets his forehead rest for a moment on Dean’s bent leg and he’s overwhelmed for a moment by how much he feels for this man. How much he doesn’t want him to go.

“Go where, babe?” Dean murmurs at him.

Oh. Oh, dear. That... was not meant to be said out loud. He sits up abruptly and can’t meet Dean’s eyes, focuses entirely on the wet shining spot his hair left on Dean’s skin. “Nothing,” he says. Too quickly to be casual. Damn him.

The bed jostles a little as Dean sits up and wraps his headphones around his mp3 player and carefully lays it on the nightstand. Ned doesn’t remember closing his eyes but at Dean’s soft, “Look at me?”, he opens them and can only manage eye contact for a moment before he’s staring at Dean’s freckled fingers curled around his wrist. “Does this have anything to do with the past few days? You acting all weird and nervous?”

“I don’t mean to be,” he starts.

“When I got back, right? Did something happen while I was gone?”

“Oh, what? No,” Ned shakes his head. Technically, nothing happened. Just his head getting in the way of things. “No, nothing.”

“Uh-huh,” Dean mutters. He sounds unconvinced, but Ned doesn’t know how to make this go away. Even though he doesn’t want it to. He’ll take Dean in an awkward situation of his own making than not at all. “That! That right there,” Dean exclaims, points at Ned’s face.

Ned tries to sit back a little but Dean’s grip on his arm tightens and his other hand comes to rest against Ned’s cheek. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he tries to say without bumping Dean’s hand off.

He isn’t expecting Dean to laugh softly. “Buddy, you aren’t as good with hiding your feelings as you think you are. You keep looking at me like you’re never going to see me again...” he trails off for a moment, considering. “Like you’re expecting me to run.” His eyes widen at what he sees on Ned’s face and okay, Ned’s going to have to work on this massive personal failure apparently. “You think I’m going to run? Why? What did I do?”

Really, Ned isn’t even sure how to answer that. Dean hasn’t done anything. He tells him as much. “But you still think I’m not in this for the long-haul.”

“Are you?” Ned knows his face shows how flummoxed he is now, because he is. Long-haul? How long was a long-haul? It sounded like a long time. Longer than he ever considered possible.

“Aren’t you?” Dean kinda looks like he wants to shake Ned. “Hey, look at me. I’m in this one, dude. Now whether you’re with me or not, that’s a different story and I think it’s one we need to talk about. Now.”

“Um.”

He has no thoughts. All thoughts have flown the coop. Dean is in this, and what’s more, he sounds serious about it. Ned wasn’t expecting this. He doesn’t want Dean to leave. What Ned wants and what he gets are just two different things though.

“Um? Anything else?” Green eyes flash angrily at him.

“Yes, lots else. Um. I mean, sorry. Okay. You didn’t do anything, right? I just, figured. That you would. Leave, that is.” He chances a peek at Dean’s face again and it’s very carefully blank.

“Why?”

“Everyone does?” He’s not sure why he said it as a question. It’s pretty blatant fact.

“Everyone, huh? Like,” Dean shrugs, “Olive. Or Emerson. Or Vivian and Lily. I’ll give you Chuck, but only partially because you brought her back. I get your parents, too and yeah, man that sucks. I really do get it. But take a look around you.” He gestures sort of meaninglessly around the room considering they’re the only two in it.

“Okay...”

“They haven’t left you. They all love you.” He stops abruptly and clears his throat noisily. “You’ve got a family here, Ned. Things may not have started out that great, and wow, believe me, I get that more than you know, but things don’t have to stay not-great.” He jerks his shoulders up in a tense shrug. “I thought we were doing something pretty great.”

And Ned... may in fact feel like the biggest idiot on the planet. But just in case, he has to make sure. “So, you’re not planning to leave and never come back?”

The face Dean makes in response is what he believes would in fact be classified as a ‘bitch-face’. Interesting.

“I am not planning on leaving and never coming back,” he says. Ned feels two warm hands on either side of his face and he looks up finally. “If you could stop being a moron for two seconds I would tell you how much I am not planning on leaving and never coming back.”

“I can do that.” He thinks.

Dean gets up off the bed and goes rummaging through his duffle bag. Ned notices that it’s nearly empty, which is strange. He recalls Dean living out of it. While he’s thinking about that turn of events, Dean comes back and shoves a piece of paper in his hand. It’s been folded in fourths and Ned pulls it open, turns it right-side up to read...

A For Rent flyer?

“What’s this?”

“This is the house Sammy just rented,” Dean says slowly. Like he’s waiting for Ned to catch on. “Just Sam? What about you?”

Dean waves a hand around and says, “Figured I’m good where I am.” And then he takes a good look around the room.

Dean’s clothes are hanging in the closet. His combat boots are peeking out from beneath the dresser where they’ve been kicked off. His phone (the other phone) is charging, plugged into the wall. Ned can see the pearl handle of Dean’s favorite gun resting on the other nightstand. Dirty clothes in the hamper, Dean’s razor is next to Ned’s on the sink. His shaving cream can is leaving rust circles on the porcelain.

When he wasn’t looking, apparently Dean moved in.

The biggest idiot on the planet? Make that the universe.

“Oh.” Ned isn’t even sure what to say at this point.

“Yeah,” Dean smirks. “Oh.”

Neither of them say anything for a moment, the silence stretching between them. “So, this is good.”

“This is good,” Dean confirms.

“We should buy Sam a house-warming gift,” Ned muses.

“I thought we could just make him a pie.”

Ned nods, but is already planning on finding a suitable gift tomorrow. What does one even give for a house-warming? Maybe he could ask Olive. The bed dips as Dean comes to settle next to him. Bumps his shoulder as he asks, “We good?"

“We’re good. And I’m sorry,” he says belatedly, “For doubting you. And for being an idiot.”

“I accept apologies in kisses and pie,” Dean tells him seriously. But there’s a mischievous glint in his eye. Ned leans in anyway to give Dean an I’m-sorry peck on the lips and is surprised to find himself on his back staring up at Dean, who’s pinned him down and really, Ned isn’t that athletic so he doesn’t know why Dean finds this so funny. He’s sure to give his best unamused glare for good measure.

“Hilarious, Dean.”

“I thought so.”

Ned’s taller but Dean’s bulkier and stronger, but maybe he also doesn’t want to get up just yet. Dean’s weight is comforting and warm, solid and so very present that Ned allows him his little game far longer than he normally would. Dean rolls off him after a few more moments and Ned aches a little for the loss.

They’re staring up at the ceiling fan rotating lazily above them and Ned reaches for Dean’s hand. Holds on to it and brings it to his lips. “I’m sorry,” he whispers against freckled skin. Dean wordlessly nods in acceptance and his face is fond. “I can’t guarantee I won’t be an idiot sometimes.”

“I guarantee I’ll always call you on it when you are,” Dean promises. “I can’t guarantee that I’ll be here all the time. But I will always call when I can. And I will do my damndest to come back, unless I can’t. Never because I won’t.”

“I guarantee that I’ll always answer the phone,” Ned promises back. He can’t address the second issue just yet. He knows what Dean does is dangerous. Doesn’t mean he has to like it.

They lay like that until the room grows dark and their stomachs are rumbling, making promises, but only to things they know they won’t break. Ned thinks that this is going to work – that they are going to work. His dad wasn’t lying, he and Dean are good for each other. He doesn’t expect things to be perfect, of course, but he finally has someone to be not-perfect with and that? That’s what makes it perfect.

**Author's Note:**

> They're cute. You're cute too.


End file.
